Skype network visualised 950 companies 65k employess 50 countries Notes: Brand on public Linkedin profiles only and companies defined “tech” as per Atomico’s proprietary taxonmy model; Nodes size represent total capital raised by companies, VC Sources: Powered by funds are not sized according to their AuM. Data as of 20th of Septem- ber2023. The next wave The Skype effect speaks to the catalytic impact of just one success story. Back in 2003, during the darkest days for the European technology industry following the dotcom crash, would anyone have predicted that the value of the ecosystem today would have increased by a factor of more than 45x to hit $3T? Would many have predicted that billion-dollar exits would start to be counted by the hundred? Surely not. And yet, in just the past 昀椀ve years alone, there have been a remarkable 111 billion-dollar exits of European tech companies. This is a huge number, but it is also just the start. Europe’s never had a stronger pipeline of billion-dollar exit candidates. This also underlines why it’s so critical for the ecosystem to see a return to a healthy and functioning exit mar- ket, both in the form of entry to public markets, as well as through M&A. | 62